Dark Stranger
by Lesley W
Summary: Sam Beckett was the first person in a long time to see the kind heart, the compassionate soul, the true spirit that resides within the angry, broken desperate man known as Al Calavicci. As it turns out, he wasn't the only one. Set in 1985 (Project Star Bright). I apologize for any confusion the disappearance and reemergence of this story might have caused. I'm still a newb here.
1. Prologue

**Dark Stranger: A Quantum Leap Fan Fiction Story by Lesley Wentzell**

 **Prologue**

 _Tonight's the night I finally get my retribution for everything you bastards have done to me! For every guy I've ever met who has lied to me, beaten me, and used me: It's time. I don't care who it is;_ _ **somebody's**_ _gotta pay! And since I wouldn't be able to track down all the rotten sons of bitches who have wronged me even if I lived_ _ **seven**_ _lifetimes, the least I can do is strike back, leave one marred warning for the rest of them: Don't fuck with us because we've had it! They're all the same, anyway._

 _So, who's the lucky guy? I've been scoping this dive all night and… A-ha!_ _ **That**_ _one: The man standing at the jukebox._ _Aw, poor baby! He looks so lost… so alone. How many women's hearts has_ _ **he**_ _broken? It doesn't matter. That's the one. He's perfect: Suave, dark-haired, shit-faced, sulking._

 _Now that I think of it, the last asshole who raped me looked an awful lot like this guy. He owned a beautiful wood and fiberglass Trimaran: A 1966 forty foot Lodestar which he christened the_ _ **"Dark Stranger."**_ _In the end, after everything I put into that fucking vessel—physically, financially and emotionally—I miss her a hell of a lot more than I miss_ _ **his**_ _abusive ass!_

 _Alright, my Dark Stranger. It's time for my revenge… You're mine!_


	2. Chapter 1

**Tuesday: March 26, 1985 10:18 pm**

 **Landry's Place**

 **Albuquerque, New Mexico**

"Why am I here?"

His soft lament went unnoticed by the fifty or so noisy patrons in the tiny watering hole. Some were drinking, some talking, others were dancing—poorly would be a polite way of putting it. Whatever they were doing, they all looked like they were enjoying themselves. Everyone except him.

 _He_ was… frozen.

Captain Albert M. Calavicci shook his head in self-recrimination. Standing in front of the jukebox, his trembling, out-stretched hand hovered over a song selection he wanted desperately to make and, at the same time, never wanted to hear again.

 _Allie Boy, you are losin' it._

When Al was a POW in Vietnam, one of his fellow captives was an eighteen year old from New York City, an Army PFC by the name of Rudy Stocker. The only enlisted person in a camp full of officers, he had been thrown into the camp during Al's third year of internment. Was it the third? He couldn't really be sure. Time stood still in that nightmare. That hell…

Rudy was an avid collector of DC comics; especially _Superman_. A sad smile passed across Al's face as he recalled an attempt to calm the kid by getting him to talk about his favorite saga. Rudy had said he was particularly fond of Action Comics issue number 263 because it introduced DC fans to the _Bizarro World_. Everyone in the camp agreed it was an accurate description of the jungles of Vietnam.

How appropriate that Al's memory would find that particular neurological file. In a way, that's where he was now. Trapped in some topsy-turvy universe where nothing made sense anymore. Even the only two friends he had left seemed derelict in their respective duties: An almost forgotten Chivello Cigar hanging loosely in his right hand was supposed to soothe his frayed nerves. The booze he'd been siphoning all evening was supposed to cloak him in a warm blanket of blissful ignorance. Yet, here he stood. Unable to mute the pain. Despondent. Fearful. Inept. Incapable of making a simple song selection to commemorate the birth of his lost love.

Al lowered his head in disbelief. For Christ's sake, he orbited the Moon! What had he become? More importantly, what was to become of him?

He sighed, closed his eyes and took a long drag on his cigar, reflecting on the events of the past week; more specifically, of the last few hours. On one hand, it wasn't completely Maxine's fault. Before their separation, he had wrongfully accused her of cheating on him. She was hurt and angry. How could the fifth addition to the Calavicci Ex-Wives Club have known that the horrible nightmares of the past decade had returned to once again rob Al of all but two hours of sleep per week? Sure, it was sleep he only attained after drowning in a bottle, but again, she couldn't have known that; any more than she could have known that today was… _is_ … Beth's birthday!

On the other hand, it was still a cheap shot:

" _Oh, yeah? Well, maybe I_ _ **should**_ _have fucked that Jarhead, Al_ _!"_ Maxine's voice was more acidic over the phone than it had been the last time they had spoken face to face.

" _Anything's better than watching you pine away for your first wife!"_

Goddamned cheap.

 _The proverbial straw_ , he mused silently, _as Beth would say. Oh, Beth…_

Less than an hour after he slammed down the phone—after he'd cleared the contents of his desktop with an infuriated swipe of his arm and after he downed the remaining three quarters of a bottle of Jack Daniels—Al found himself engaged in batting practice. Project Star Bright's second floor break room was the ball park. The bat was a hammer. The ball was a dime-pilfering vending machine. The spectators in the stands… thankfully there had been only one witness to Al's meltdown.

Al snickered harshly at himself. Once upon a time, he was actually a decent pitcher in the Navy. Funny how all of his accomplishments could be referred to in the past tense.

" _Women are poison!"_ This time the voice in his head belonged to his old Wingman, Chip. They were on Liberty in Japan at the time.

" _Not all women,"_ Al had replied solemnly.

" _Shit, Bingo… I'm sorry. You know I wasn't talking about Lisa. It just seems like every woman I meet winds up being a complete psycho… like Marcy."_

" _That says more about you, Chip, than it does about them,"_ Al had replied with a reassuring wink.

God, how he missed Chip! And his father… and the kindhearted Charles "Black Magic" Walters… his sister, Trudy… Lisa… Beth. Damn it all, why does everyone he's ever loved always leave him?

Al shook the self-pitying thought from his mind, returning his attention to the spectator in the break room. When he pulled the hammer out of Al's hand, the look of concern on the young man's face was one that usually came with a lifetime of friendship.

" _Whatever you're going through,"_ the kind, brilliant young Quantum Physicist said to him, _"you don't have to do it alone. Let me help you."_

In spite of his ever-growing despair, Al actually smiled.

"Sam's a nice kid," he murmured to no one in particular. "Dunno why he cares about what happens to me, but those Washington nozzles are gonna eat him alive if he doesn't watch his ass."

In his clouded memory, Al recalled saying something similar to the brilliant scientist who had offered him the first words of compassion he had heard since who the hell knows when. Better to keep the kid at arm's length. It was bad enough _his_ career was as good as finished; why drag anyone else down with him?

Al shook his head once more, realizing that he had just uttered out loud what he'd said to Sam earlier. If the Committee could see him now, the Project's Head Administrator—a washed-up, inebriated wreck—talking to himself in front of a jukebox, he would probably end up in an institution. Just like…

 _Why, you useless son of a bitch! Trudy deserves better than that! You've earned what's comin' to you, Calavicci._

Al sighed, heavily. Defeated, exhausted, and still wondering what the hell had possessed him to come to this hole in the wall in the first place, he abandoned the jukebox and staggered to the nearest table. He held his head in his hands and waited for the next waitress to approach him with the promise of his liquid tranquilizer.

Fat lot of good it had done for him so far.

Al's normally heightened powers of observation which he'd cultivated through years of service in the Navy were completely oblivious to the raven-haired beauty who had been watching him since he walked through the front entrance.


	3. Chapter 2

Her name, like the color of her scorned, eager eyes, was Amber. Dark, almost black hair cascaded around her twenty-three year old face, flowing just above her shoulders. With mounting anticipation, she glared at her hapless victim.

 _They haven't invented a headcount for the number of sheets this guy's thrown to the wind. Oh, yeah… You'll do nicely, my Dark Stranger!_

Putting on her most innocuous, yet seductive smile, Amber slinked her way over to Al's table.

"So, what happened, honey?" she cooed. "Did the big, bad jukebox bite you?"

Al paused before acknowledging the source of the sultry tones, taking special care to blow his cigar smoke in the opposite direction. Amber chose to ignore the consideration. When he finally looked at her, the sadness and recognition in his deep, brown eyes was unmistakable.

 _I remind him of her! Whoever he's trying to drink out of his memory, right now I'm_ _ **her**_ _! This is gonna be easier than I thought. He does have remarkable eyes; I'll give 'em that. Not bad looking either…_

"You didn't answer my question, stud."

Al blinked twice. "Huh?" he murmured. "Oh, right… the jukebox. Just changed my mind, that's all. But you go ahead, baby doll. Unless someone else beat you to my selection there, go on. Knock yourself out." The beautiful, melancholy sounds of Elton John's _Someone Saved My Life Tonight_ filled the room and Al rolled his eyes. He loved the song, but it had been playing on someone's radio just moments before Al stormed out of his office following his phone call to Maxine. Clearly he wasn't going to catch a break tonight. In a deflated, _okay-you-can-leave-now_ , gesture, he waived his hand at the gorgeous interloper.

"Listen, sweetheart," Al said despondently, "if it was any other night, I'd be all over you like a cheap suit, but…" Too drained to finish his sentence, Al let his voice trail away with another swig. He set the empty glass on the table, waived his hand at the waitress and, once again, waited.

 _Damn! How many women have you liquefied with those velvet tones? Jesus, Amber! Get a grip! Remember why you're here._

Not the slightest bit deterred, Amber sat down next to him, nodding a "no thank you" as the waitress who brought over Al's refill asked if she wanted anything.

"I'll cut right to the chase, sexy pants: You look like a guy who needs a diversion. I've got a motel room not more than ten minutes away from this dump. Whaddya say? You in?"

Al looked her up and down. "Depends," he said dryly, trying desperately to ignore the shift in her visage to something so warm, someone so familiar. Someone forever lost to him.

"On what, babe?" Amber asked pleasantly.

Al's left eyebrow arched almost imperceptibly as he shifted the glass from one hand to the other. "Well, are you sellin' it, cutie, or is this a freebee?" The confidence in Al's tone was a cover. His senses were deadening by the second.

Amber masked a triumphant smile with a girly pout. "What do I look like?" she objected, trying her best to sound insulted. "A prostitute?"

Dwindling faculties or not, Al wasn't buying it.

"Don't yank my goddamned chain, sweetheart," he grumbled. "I'm not in the mood for it." Even though the anger in his words was dulled by the haze of alcohol—not to mention his incalculable feelings of desolation coupled by months of sleep deprivation—his cynicism hadn't been completely washed away.

Not yet at least.

Amber, nonetheless, was not about to give up that easily. In a convincing display of sympathy, she patted his left hand, lingering seductively. Slowly, very slowly, she laced her fingers between his, lightly massaging him. She then withdrew her hand from his and reached under the table. Al caught her, gently but firmly laying her hand back on the table.

"No means no," he said softly.

Amber conceded. Or she seemed to. "Okay," she sighed. "So I'm a working girl. Bang, ya got me! It doesn't change the fact that you need a distraction. Clearly, your go-to vices aren't working." She gestured to the glass in his left hand and the stogie in his right, "Come with me, baby, and I'll _make_ you forget!"

A small, quiet chuckle echoed in the glass as Al pounded down what was left in it. He closed his eyes, taking a final drag on his cigar before he crushed its tiny remains in the ashtray on the table. Motioning one final time to the waitress, he stuffed a bill under the empty glass.

"Keep the change," Al said monotonously.

To Amber, he added dejectedly, "You're driving."


	4. Chapter 3

**Tuesday: March 26, 1985 11:48pm**

 **The First Stop Motor Lodge**

 **Albuquerque, New Mexico**

Al had left his jet-black 1956 Chevy Corvette parked at the bar and was staggering out of Amber's 1979 maroon Ford Thunderbird with ever waning awareness.

"Why am I here?" Al whispered again.

Not sure if he was directing the question at himself, his company, or the One his grief-stricken ten-year-old self swore never to speak to again, Al followed Amber into her motel room. As he did so, everything began to spin. He blinked defiantly, desperately; inwardly begging for it to stop.

"No, please…"

"What was that, stud?"

Then the world he knew—the world of pain and loss, of bad judgement and alcoholic haze, of sleep-depriving nightmares and Conduct Unbecoming—dissolved around him. There was no looming dishonorable discharge, no end of everything that still mattered to him. For this brief, intoxicating, deluded moment, there was only…

"Beth," he whispered.

"Uh… sure thing, babe. Whatever you want." Amber beckoned him over to the bed. "Come to Beth, honey."

She slid out of her jean jacket, pulled off her tank top, and began shimmying out of her miniskirt. She was just about to unhook her bra when Al's hands gently stopped her.

"Please… allow me," he murmured.

Al's lips brushed the side of her neck as he carefully removed her bra. Caressing her bare breasts, Al trembled with what seemed like a decade of longing for the love of his life.

"Oh, Beth…" he breathed into her ear. "Beth, I've missed you so much, honey."

 _What the fuck is wrong with me? I've done this a thousand times; it's my job, for Christ's sake! He's just like the rest of them, remember? This isn't supposed to feel good… He's not supposed to feel—_

Amid her internal reproach, Amber found that she was responding to him, almost as though his attentiveness, his tenderness, his passionate embrace was truly meant for her! Mechanically, she began to unbutton his shirt and was running her hands down his chest. Her eyes widened as she saw the scars across his chest and back. A particularly deep one ran vertically between his left shoulder and collarbone.

 _Oh, God!_

"What happened to you?" Amber gasped before she could stop herself.

Al smiled reassuringly as though he'd known her all of his life. "Hush, my love," he said softly.

Amber felt her lower lip begin to quiver. Al, sinking deeper into the fantasy his tormented, inebriated mind had created, couldn't bear to see " _his Beth"_ on the verge of tears. He took her in his arms and held her gently. The image of his first wife began to tremble.

"Shhhhh, Beth honey… please don't cry."

Al began to rock her in his arms, softly placing her head on his bare shoulder, gently stroking her hair, lovingly caressing the side of her face. To him, they were dancing to the song that had caused his earlier ambivalence.

 _Just an old sweet song…_

To Amber, it was like nothing she had experienced before.

She closed her eyes, inwardly curing herself. As she opened them again, she looked up into beautiful, caring dark eyes; eyes that saw her as someone else. A lifetime of anger lifted from her soul and Amber wished she could stay with him forever. But it wasn't right. She had seduced him. She had taken advantage of his despair, his hopelessness. Now she was fighting her own delusions, wanting desperately to stay locked in this sweet embrace that wasn't intended for her. She had to put a stop to it.

 _I never knew there were men like you out there. I'm so sorry! Please forgive me!_

Al smiled at her again. One hand lifted Amber's chin as he sweetly kissed her lips. The other delicately traced up and down the small of her back. Amber couldn't suppress her ecstatic shudder.

"Would you believe," Al said slyly, enjoying her reaction, "I learned that little maneuver from playing pool?"

She laughed.

"What a beautiful sound," Al sighed. "Kept me alive all those years. Just as 'Magic' saved me when I was a kid…" His voice began to quiver. "Beth, there's… something I need to tell you."

 _This is wrong!_ _ **I**_ _was wrong! The poor guy's been through enough. Say something, goddamnit! Stop him!_

"Beth, I'm so sorry, honey… I'm sorry I wasn't there for you. I spent so many years running away: Running from my father's death… running away from the orphanage… running away from Trudy's death… Oh, my beautiful Beth, I never knew what happiness was until I met you!"

 _Tell him you're not his Beth._

"I know you wanted to divorce me after I came home from the first tour in Vietnam. Less than half a year had gone by and I was leaving for a second. I was leaving you again, Beth! I always felt I was doing my duty, serving my Country, but maybe… _just_ _maybe_ … there was more to it than that. Maybe I didn't think I deserved to be happy… that I should leave you before you could leave me the way everyone else has! But, Beth, you _have_ to know… please know that when the VC captured me, you were the only thing keeping me alive!"

 _VC…? He was a POW! Just like my brother! No, no! This isn't right. Tell him you're not his Beth._

"They tried to break me, Beth." Tears were streaming down Al's face. "Oh, how those bastards tried! But they couldn't. I was free."

 _TELL HIM!_

"No matter what they did to me, Beth… I was free because I knew you were waiting for me to come home to you. Your love is what kept me alive. You kept me sane… you kept me free… I love you, Beth. I love you s-so mu-much. Thank you for saving my li…"

Al's eyes slid closed and he collapsed onto the bed.

"Oh, God!" Amber whispered.

Her trembling hands flew to her face as she began to sob. She sat next to her intended victim, rocking back and forth, fighting to catch her breath.

"I'm so sorry!" she finally choked. Her gaze was fixed upon Al as though she never wanted to look away, or leave his side.

Or hurt him.

Time seemed to stand still as Amber watched Al's chest rise and fall. Slowly and deeply. He looked ten years younger than the wretched, hopeless shell she first encountered in the bar. A peaceful calm seemed to envelop him as though his painful, sincere, heart wrenching confession had soothed his tortured soul every bit as much as Amber's. As much as she imagined it would have done for his Beth.

She tentatively reached across and touched Al's face. A soft, dreamlike murmur escaped his lips. Amber gently ran her hand along his relaxed brow. Tears were still falling from her light brown eyes.

"I had no right to hear any of that," she whispered mournfully, "but… thank you. You saved… _my_ life."

Slowly, carefully, Amber rose from the bed. She put her clothes back on, pulled the sheet and blanket around Al and kissed his forehead. As restful and serene as he looked now, Amber doubted he was going to feel that way when he awoke. There had to be someone she could call. He shouldn't be alone after everything he'd been through and, though she desperately wanted to stay with him, Amber felt the handsome Dark Stranger deserved far better than her company.

With a motivation that couldn't have been any more different than when she initially set eyes on him, Amber searched his jacket pocket for his wallet. She pulled out two cards: One was his license; the other was his Military ID.

"Calavicci," she read aloud. "Albert M. Captain. United States Navy. Nice to meet you, Capt… Nice to meet you, Al. Wait a minute!" Amber's heart caught in her throat as she recalled a conversation she once had with her older brother Rudy. Could this be…?

Amber sobbed again.

Now she _had_ to help him!

Another card caught her attention. "Project Star Bright? What the hell is that?" Amber flipped it over and smiled. A phone number was written in pen. Next to the number was a name. The name was underlined. Twice.

Amber looked at the clock radio next to the bed. It was 3:00 am. "Shit," she swore hopelessly. "No, you need a friend right now. I'm sure this person will understand."

Returning Al's card and IDs to their rightful place, Amber nervously dialed. As the phone rang, she dove into her own jacket pockets, making sure she had the motel key in hand, ready to pass the torch. She then heard the sound of the other end being picked up and a very sleepy voice answered.

"Mmmmph… Hello?"

"He-hello. Is this… Sam?"


	5. Epilogue

**Epilogue**

 **Wednesday: March 27, 1985 5:04 am**

 **The First Stop Motor Lodge**

 **Albuquerque, New Mexico**

"I don't remember much of anything, Sam."

An incredibly embarrassed Al Calavicci was sitting on the edge of the bed, gingerly massaging slow circles into his throbbing temples. Sam had arrived an hour ago and apparently let himself in with the key Amber had given him. Under any other set of circumstances, Al might have been infuriated by the intrusion. Truth be told, however, he was glad to see the young scientist. There was genuine concern in Sam's eyes. Additionally, to Sam's credit, he didn't go all medic on the humiliated Naval Officer, save for insisting that Al keep drinking the mineral water and orange juice he had brought with him. At Al's initial sneer, Sam had suggested, for the time being, that it would be better than coffee.

Al slowly got up and began to pace. "So, what happens next?" he sardonically asked around the freshly lit cigar in his mouth. Pulling the stogie back out with a visible tremor in his right hand, he added, "I suppose I could start writing my resignation. Save 'em the trouble of canning my ass. He laughed humorlessly. "I mean, hey! It worked for Nixon."

Sam Beckett nervously pursed his lips. This was an extremely delicate situation. The anxious Navy Captain who continued to wear a trench into the cheaply carpeted motel room floor was a broken man who had reached the end of his emotional tether. Though they just met less than twenty four hours ago, it was obvious to Sam that Al Calavicci's cause for dread stretched further than the thought of losing his position at Star Bright. His trepidation reached beyond the possible end to a distinguished military career.

The missing fragments of a drunken encounter with a woman whose name Al didn't know; his current inability to recall what he confessed to her in his distressed, hallucinatory state, which was so painful, so revealing that it prompted her to search his wallet to find someone to call; to say nothing of how much of it she, in turn, might have told Sam in order to convince him to drive all the way out to nowhere's-ville. All of this and God knows what else was threatening to viciously strip away what little control Al had left.

He was scared.

He needed reassurance.

He needed a friend.

Sam swallowed. His heart truly went out to Al. More than anything, he wanted to help, but he had to tread lightly. He had to choose his words carefully.

"Al," he said gently, "I know you're hurting. I know that, right now, everything seems hopeless, but it could have ended so much worse if you hadn't… you know… met someone with a conscience."

Al looked at Sam for what seemed like an eternity. Then he threw his head back and laughed wholeheartedly.

Sam stared at him in disbelief. "What's so funny?" he stammered.

"I heard you have multiple doctorates, kid. Is that true?"

"Um, yeah. Seven, in fact." There wasn't a trace of arrogance in Sam's reply.

Impressed by the credentials of his young companion, not to mention the humble earnestness in his tone, Al stroked his chin thoughtfully. "Hmmm… seven," he mused. "I'm gonna take a wild guess that none of 'em is in Psychiatry."

Sam couldn't help it. Before long, he was laughing right along with his new-found friend. He didn't need a psychiatric degree to realize that the emotional release was healthy. And a good sign.

All at once, Al's expression changed and some of the color the laughter had brought back to his face began to disappear rapidly. He wiped his eyes and took an unsteady breath.

"Look, kid, I appreciate you comin' but… well, part of me wishes you hadn't."

Sam started to open his mouth in protest, but Al held up his hand.

"Sam-Sam, listen… Take a washed up ol' Jet Jock's advice, will ya? I'm done, alright? _Finito_." Al made a slashing motion across his throat to punctuate his somber capitulation. "You've got the rest of your career to think about. Don't…" Al's voice trailed off. The sadness in his dark eyes finished what he dared not speak aloud.

 _Don't waste it on me, kid._

Al sat back on the edge of the bed, placed his stogie in the ashtray, and buried his face in his hands.

Sam moved cautiously towards him and put a hand on his shoulder. He could feel Al's muscles tense, then relax in gratitude at the gesture of support. Sam's thoughts turned to his older brother Tom. _He'd_ know what to say to the anguished Captain. Al sensed the change in the younger man's demeanor and looked up at him.

"You okay, kid?"

"My brother Tom was… he was killed in Vietnam."

"I'm sorry, Sam." Al gave a paternal pat to the hand that was still on his shoulder. Genuine sympathy was evident in his eyes.

Sam nodded an unspoken appreciation and inhaled deeply. "Al, I… There's no way I could ever know what you went through over there, but I do _understand_." The empathy brought a small, but still cautious, smile to Al's face. Sam seized the moment. "And I know," he added with certainty, "that someone who has survived as much as you have is not _'finito.'_ Not by a damned long shot!"

Al slowly dropped his hands into his lap. He rose from the bed, retrieved his cigar, and resumed his pace. His eyes narrowed as he regarded the young scientist with a mixture of inexplicable fondness and cautious skepticism. Al couldn't remember the last time he'd met someone as instantly likable as Sam Beckett.

It scared the hell out of him.

After a few more minutes of pacing and numerous puffs on his cigar, Al found his voice again.

"How do you know I'm not finished?" he asked, waving his right hand expansively. "You got a crystal ball in your pocket?"

Sam smiled at him. "I grew up on a farm in Elk Ridge, Indiana," he said nostalgically. "You learn how to read people when your livelihood depends on your neighbors and vice versa."

Al ran a hand across his face. "So, there's more to farm life than just milking cows," he said with a grin. Then, just as before, the smile faded and his anxiety resurfaced.

"Sam, what did…?" Al waived his hand in a circle as though the action could pull the information he was seeking out of thin air.

Sam understood. "Amber," he supplied.

"Amber… yeah, right. Amber." Al softly repeated her name several times to try and induce some recollection of what had occurred a few hours ago. A blank fog in his memory was the reply. "Well, what exactly did she say to you to get you to hall your ass all the way out here for a complete stranger?"

Sam turned away briefly. Her last words echoed in his mind:

 _"Help him, please. Help him the way he helped me. The way he helped Rudy."_

When he faced Al again, his green eyes were full of conviction. "Amber didn't want to embarrass you, so she wouldn't tell me _everything_. What she _did_ tell me is that she brought you here… to make you pay for all the rotten things that men had done to her, at least nearly every man she's ever encountered until she met you, Al. You showed her a kindness she has never known. You showed her how wrong she was to try and hold you accountable for the hurt that others inflicted upon her; your compassion convinced her to get back in touch with her brother."

Sam's thoughts were processing at breakneck speed, almost faster than he was able to get the words out of his mouth, but he couldn't have stopped himself even if he wanted to. He felt an instant kinship with this man. Nothing since he had first formulated his theory of time travel was as clear to him as the unwavering certainty that he now felt in every fiber of his being. Somehow, on several levels of consciousness, Sam knew that getting the tormented, self-deprecating soul who stood before him to once again believe in himself was more important than anything he'd achieved up to this point. He knew with that the next phase of accomplishments would be theirs. Together. As partners. Hoping he had not overwhelmed Al, Sam paused for a few beats before continuing.

"You changed her life for the better, Al. I'm not sure what I believe in spiritually, but it seems to me that someone or something out there," he cast his eyes skyward, "wanted you to walk into that bar and find her. And even if that's true, ultimately _you_ were the one who made that decision, Al. I'm sure the last thing you felt like doing, after all that's happened, was going to a crowded bar, surrounded by people who were having the time of their lives while you watched yours fall apart. Am I right?"

Wide-eyed, Al nodded. He was beyond stunned. Again, Sam's words held no trace of bravado. And he was right! The whole time he'd been at Landry's, Al kept questioning what the hell he was doing there.

The kid was perceptive. The kid was _amazing!_

"Amber felt it too, Al. She believed her life would have gone down a much darker path if it hadn't been for you. You saved her, Al… just as you saved her brother Rudy in the POW camp."

Al felt as if he might never be able to blink again. "What?" he whispered.

"You're a good person, Al. And I'm not the only one who sees it. Now all I have to do is convince _you_. And you're not finished because I need you to help me explain my String Theory to the—what did you call them?"

Al's eyes glistened with gratitude. "Washington nozzles," he said, blinking back tears.

Sam laughed. "No one can say you don't have a flare for expression." He gestured towards the door, wrapping his other arm around Al's shoulder. "Breakfast is on me," he said quietly. "You'll be all right, Al. Trust me."

"Thanks, Sam."

And he did.


End file.
